News Linux blamed for Samsung laptop deaths

[Gareth Halfacree]

Rides roughshod over sloppy UEFI BIOS.
http://www.bit-tech.net/news/hardwar...msung-deaths/1

[derviansoul]

I think samsung should just have tested the laptops appropriately to ensure that this won't happen, since there is a big minority of users that like linux in their laptops.
Doesn't matter how bigger are the profits for some of these companies, they are always cutting corners...

[docodine]

at first i thought that people were killed by samsung laptops and it was linux's fault

[Cthippo]

Kudos to Samsung for not saying "Meh, it's your fault for trying to use it differently than we intended", but rather supporting the product with a different OS. If only the other tech manufacturers were this responsive to the needs of the community.

[PingCrosby]

Bring back the death penalty

[bowman]

It's not really Samsung's fault, it's UEFI. It was supposed to be a step forward in technology and security. Instead, they've abused and twisted it for 'trusted computing'.

It's basically Anakin Skywalker that's become Darth Vader.

[Icy EyeG]

Isn't the title a bit contradictory when compared to the rest of the article? I mean:

Selected Samsung laptops are being killed thanks to a faulty implementation of UEFI interacting badly with a Samsung-specific Linux kernel module.

It's clearly on Linux fault and it only happens with a handful of Samsung laptops. It's not that all Samsung laptops were affected.

[Guinevere]

Clearly Samsungs fault for shipping hardware that could so easily be bricked through software.

[proxess]

"Samsung Laptops with faulty UEFI killed by Linux"

Seems a more appropriate title.

[Corky42]

Does Samsung even bother to test there own laptops, it not like Linux is a unknown OS

[liratheal]

Originally Posted by Corky42

Does Samsung even bother to test there own laptops, it not like Linux is a unknown OS

If it's sold as a windows machine, while it's the end users choice to install penguin of any flavour, it's not possible for them to test every permutation. It's not like they sold it as supporting Linux when it didn't - They sold the machines as windows machines, the user wanted something Samsung haven't (reasonably) tested, and it broke.

I think the take away from this is, sure it didn't work, but Samsung didn't fob the user off, and are instead working on a fix.

[Tangster]

I don't see why people think samsung is to blame here. The laptops aren't advertised as supporting linux. If anything samsung should be praised for acknowledging and working to fix the problem. It's just like people don't expect a mac to support every os under the sun.

[faugusztin]

Actually, the original code was provided by ... Samsung. And if you can fatally damage a board just by executing a code it didn't expect, then it is the failure on the side of the manufacturer. Just imagine a virus doing the same thing as this module does. Mass Samsung laptop suicide.

https://plus.google.com/111049168280...ts/h7FjkQKZHKT

Greg Kroah-HartmanYesterday 6:17 PM (edited) - Public
Hm, who would have thought that just randomly poking memory of a laptop would brick it. Long ago Samsung told me that it was just fine to be doing this, and that there would not be any problems (I based the samsung-laptop driver on code that Samsung themselves gave me.)

Turns out, it wasn't true, which is sad. Yes, the real solution is to fix the BIOS. If you have this hardware, just blacklist the samsung-laptop driver and all should be fine.

Update:
I just tested this on a 900X3D Samsung, running latest version of Ubuntu, and no problem happened at all.

So I don't know what is happening here to the people who are reporting problems, very strange...

[Phil Rhodes]

And if you can fatally damage a board just by executing a code it didn't expect, then it is the failure on the side of the manufacturer.

I thought it would come down to this.

You can kill all kinds of modern electronics by running bad code on them. It's certainly possible to brick most hard disks by sending them the right commands. Anything with firmware - which is effectively everything - can be destroyed in this way.

Much as the bug appears to be Samsung's, I just love the way the Linux people argue about how much they can be bothered to care. At some point in the Launchpad thread for this, someone called Kate Stewart apparently decides that it's "invalid" and of "undecided" importance.

Welcome to Linux! We will destroy your laptop, and then we'll claim it isn't really a problem after all, and we can't even work out whether we care or not.

[faugusztin]

Originally Posted by Phil Rhodes

I thought it would come down to this.

So you say it's fine Samsung laptops have a bug which can easily kill your laptop with any OS ? Just because it is Linux where it has been found doesn't mean you won't have a virus later which will try to do exactly this thing.

[Tangster]

Originally Posted by faugusztin

So you say it's fine Samsung laptops have a bug which can easily kill your laptop with any OS ? Just because it is Linux where it has been found doesn't mean you won't have a virus later which will try to do exactly this thing.

There's a difference between a technically unsupported OS and malicious code.

[Corky42]

But i cant find anything on the Samsung web site saying there laptops are only suitable for Windows.

[The Bodger]

Personally, I've never understood why computers can't all have a small mechanical switch on them which, if not depressed prevents fundamental BIOS firmware from being altered. This could possibly, for example, act directly on the 'read only' pin of the BIOS memory. It would guarantee that changes which could terminally brick a system were a conscious decision by the user, rather than either a mistake by bad software / drivers or malicious in nature.

As others on the forum have said, bad coding should not be allowed to kill the hardware upon which the OS is running; regardless of whether the OS is supported by the supplier of the computer or not.

[fdbh96]

Originally Posted by derviansoul

I think samsung should just have tested the laptops appropriately to ensure that this won't happen, since there is a big minority of users that like linux in their laptops.
Doesn't matter how bigger are the profits for some of these companies, they are always cutting corners...

A big minority? I don't think Samsung is to blame, as with most laptop manufacturers it recommends Windows. If loading Win8 bricked it then fair enough, but part of the risk with Linux is that you are relying on an open source community which doesn't provide the same support/warranty as Windows for example.

[aramil]

I really don't see to much of a difference between this and me running a custom linux os on my andriod tablet and phone.

If it was to brick them (ie kill the hardware) I would not be able to get samsung or any other manufacturer to fix it. They would tell me I loaded a custom OS they did not.

Well done for samsung at least looking to address the issue.

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